Species
+

Lavandula angustifolia Mill.

English lavender, Garden Lavender, Lavender, lavender

Climate known 62 photographs Temperate garden plant
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Lavandula angustifolia, formerly L. officinalis, is a flowering plant in the family Lamiaceae, native to the Mediterranean basin. Its common names include lavender, true lavender and English lavender ; also garden lavender, common lavender and narrow-leaved lavender.

Text from Wikipedia, “Lavandula angustifolia”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Lavandula

Lavandula is a genus of 47 known species of perennial flowering plants in the sage family, Lamiaceae. It is native to regions of the Iberian Peninsula and Mediterranean coastline, the Middle East, extending to the Indian subcontinent.

Text from Wikipedia, “Lavandula”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Lamiaceae
Described by
Mill.
Native to
France, Spain, Italy
Wild records
927 in range· 760 open

At a glance

Warmest month
24°C
Jul, mean day; nights 13 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1026mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Oct 123 mm (CHELSA)
Light
10–44DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Grouped as a temperate garden plant by the genus Lavandula, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (September to January and April to June in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 1026 mm a year, wettest October at 123 mm, driest July at 55 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 44 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -8.8 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Lavandula angustfolia; Lavandula delphinensis Jord., 1859; Lavandula fragrans Jord., 1859; Lavandula vera var. ligustica DeNot.

Cultivation

Grouped as a temperate garden plant by the genus Lavandula, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). The table holds no figure for this group, which spans too much for one minimum; the cold floor is the habitat's alone, and no prose comes from the table.

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (September to January and April to June in the northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (782 mm of 1026 mm) takes 8 months, September to January and April to June. Mean temperature moves 17.4 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: March to July and October to December.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 1026 mm a year, wettest October at 123 mm, driest July at 55 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1026 mm a year at the habitat, 782 mm of it September to January and April to June. Wettest month October at 123 mm, driest July at 55 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 726 mm to 1349 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 44 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 44 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 6, the highest 90th-percentile month 46).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -8.8 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -8.8 °C, the absolute minimum -16.0 °C, about 129 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 32.3 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -2.6 °C in January (across the envelope cells -8.9 °C to 1.3 °C), warmest day 23.7 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -8.8 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 56 to 61% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 6 °C in Jan to 24 °C in Jul; mean night from -3 °C in Jan to 13 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1026 mm of rain a year, most in Oct. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 719 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -16.0 °C and the 99th-percentile day 32.3 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-20°-10°10°20°30°40°frost32.3° 99th-percentile day (undated)-16.0° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200mm rainDLI 10–44RH 56–61 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 719 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C6 / 0–97 / 1–1010 / 5–1313 / 7–1617 / 12–2021 / 16–2424 / 19–2823 / 19–2719 / 15–2315 / 11–189 / 5–126 / 1–9
Night °C-3 / -9–1-2 / -8–20 / -5–43 / -3–67 / 2–1010 / 6–1413 / 9–1613 / 8–1610 / 5–136 / 2–102 / -4–5-1 / -8–2
Rain mm77 / 49–10658 / 37–8263 / 43–9096 / 61–12898 / 67–13074 / 49–10755 / 27–8468 / 44–95102 / 67–139123 / 76–167113 / 68–15099 / 62–140
DLI12 / 8–1518 / 13–2127 / 22–3034 / 30–3639 / 35–4143 / 38–4544 / 38–4638 / 33–4029 / 24–3119 / 15–2213 / 9–1510 / 6–12
RH %60 / 55–6659 / 56–6458 / 56–6259 / 57–6159 / 56–6158 / 54–6156 / 53–6057 / 54–6059 / 57–6261 / 59–6461 / 58–6660 / 56–67

Each figure is the median across the 719 grid cells holding the 921 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 994:3588 (40.275, -0.575). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -16.0 °C, 1st-percentile night -8.8 °C, 99th-percentile day 32.3 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 719 distinct grid cells holding the 921 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 994:3588 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 40.50_-0.625, lapse-corrected +346 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1534 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeFrance, Spain, Italy· introduced: Great Britain, Ireland, Austria, Germany, Bulgaria, Baltic States, Krym, East European Russia, Tunisia, East Aegean Is., Lebanon-Syria, West Himalaya, Marianas, New York, Vermont, Venezuela
Kew's description“subshrub” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker44.345, 5.948 · in the densest population, 602 records (65% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 927 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 760 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 2 km away. 221 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 6 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 927 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Lavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifoliaLavandula angustifolia

Photographs: (c) Naturalista, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) luluchouette, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Fabien Piednoir, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA); (c) Jan Vršovský, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA); (c) jamie-aa, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Julia Palmer, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Lavandula angustifolia, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Antibacterial Effects of the Essential Oils of Commonly Consumed Medicinal Herbs Using an In Vitro Model
Marina Sokóvić, Jasmina Glamočlija, Petar D. Marin, Dejan Brkić (2010) · Molecules
GC-MS Analysis of Essential Oils from Some Greek Aromatic Plants and Their Fungitoxicity on Penicillium digitatum
Dimitra Daferera, Basil N. Ziogas, Moschos G. Polissiou (2000) · Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry
Antioxidant activity of extracts obtained by different isolation procedures from some aromatic herbs grown in Lithuania
Airidas Dapkevicius, R. Venskutonis, Teris A. van Beek, J.P.H. Linssen (1998) · Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture
Antifungal Activities ofOriganumvulgaresubsp.hirtum, Mentha spicata,Lavandula angustifolia, andSalvia fruticosaEssential Oils against Human Pathogenic Fungi
Konstantia Adam, Afroditi Sivropoulou, Stella Kokkini, Θωμάς Λαναράς (1998) · Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry
AROMAS OF ROSEMARY AND LAVENDER ESSENTIAL OILS DIFFERENTIALLY AFFECT COGNITION AND MOOD IN HEALTHY ADULTS
Mark Moss, J.M. Cook, Keith Wesnes, Paul Duckett (2003) · International Journal of Neuroscience
Anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties of the leaf extracts and essential oil of Lavandula angustifolia Mill.
Valiollah Hajhashemi, Alireza Ghannadi, Badie Sharif (2003) · Journal of Ethnopharmacology
Aromatherapy: Evidence for Sedative Effects of the Essential Oil of Lavender after Inhalation
Gerhard Buchbauer, Leopold Jirovetz, Walter Jäger (1991) · Zeitschrift für Naturforschung C
Exploring Pharmacological Mechanisms of Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) Essential Oil on Central Nervous System Targets
Víctor López, Birgitte Nielsen, Maite Solas, Marı́a J. Ramı́rez (2017) · Frontiers in Pharmacology
Studies on the mode of action of the essential oil of LavenderLavandula angustifolia P. Miller)
Maria Lis‐Balchin, Stephen L. Hart (1999) · Phytotherapy Research
Adverse effects of herbal medicines: an overview of systematic reviews
Paul Posadzki, Leala K. Watson, Edzard Ernst (2013) · Clinical Medicine
Neuroprotective and Anti-Aging Potentials of Essential Oils from Aromatic and Medicinal Plants
Muhammad Ayaz, Abdul Sadiq, Muhammad Junaid, Farhat Ullah (2017) · Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Lavandula 3 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 103 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.